


Stranger's Shadow

by gloriouswhisperstyphoon



Series: a thousand threads of a life never lived [2]
Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: F/M, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell Fusion, Magical Realism AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2019-07-03 13:41:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,600
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15820020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloriouswhisperstyphoon/pseuds/gloriouswhisperstyphoon
Summary: There are few true examples of magical events occurring in England following the 1500s, but there is one that appears to have a grain of truth to it and it is the story of the Lady of Eadu. Whilst most stories involving the Otherlanders or the Fae, as they are known in casual parlance, involve people being taken by them against their will, this story is unique in that the Lady herself willingly entered the Halls of the Fae.Or: a historical tale of Jyn Erso, the Lady of Eadu and the reasons by which she left the world of Man in favour of the Fae.





	Stranger's Shadow

There are few true examples of magical events occurring in England following the 1500s, but there is one that appears to have a grain of truth to it and it is the story of the Lady of Eadu. Whilst most stories involving the Otherlanders or the Fae, as they are known in casual parlance, involve people being taken by them against their will, this story is unique in that the Lady herself willingly entered the Halls of the Fae. 

Little is known about the Lady herself, save that her family had all perished in a single tragic incident and that she had chosen to retire to the small village, although rumours abound as to the finer details of her life. 

The sole piece of first-hand evidence as to her existence comes from a letter by the Reverend of Eadu Parish:

_ It is quite strange that Miss E___ should choose to make her home in Eadu, which, by all accounts, has none of the comforts which she has become accustomed to, as it is rumoured that she is from the Continent, with the coffee houses and fashionable salons that are common there. However, she is quite popular amongst the children and my own daughter has become quite enamoured with her, though she does not allow any save her staff to visit her in her cottage. It is quite unclear what has brought her here, but I believe that she does not mean any harm.  _

However, what is known about the Lady was that she was strikingly beautiful, and as men are wont to do, they began to court her, although it is known that she did nothing to either encourage or discourage her attentions. As such, within the village, she became well-known for her beauty and her kindness although she was a practitioner of the Magical Arts. 

By all accounts, the first few weeks of the Lady’s taking up residence in Eadu were relatively peaceful, although strange events began when she visited the parish church to ask about the constant tolling of the bells. For, as one knows, church bells only toll on the hour, and so it was for the church at Eadu. This response promptly made the lady quite disconcerted, and she ran away muttering about  _ Sidhe _ and the Otherlanders. 

The next few weeks were quite alarming, for the Lady would not leave her cottage and was heard by her staff (her maid and her cook) to be constantly whispering about Sidhe and the Otherlanders, for she wished to learn their tongue in order to stop the sound of the bells and to remove a wood that she could see from her cottage, but no one else could. But, as it is known, Sidhe may only be learned from an Otherlander and all her attempts failed. In desperation, she cast a spell from Pale’s Grimoire, which was well-known to be a fraud, but in any case, managed to get the attention of the Otherlanders. 

The Otherlanders sent a being who was known to be extremely stubborn and not like to bargain with mortals. It was believed that this being would be able to dissuade the Lady from her current path by the simple fact that he would simply be silent. 

The being that was sent bore a name in Sidhe that sounded quite like “falcon”, but for all intents and purposes, was given the name Cassian upon his arrival in Eadu. 

The fae who went by the name Cassian, rather than dissuading the Lady from her path, instead returned to his Queen to inform her that the Lady’s mirrors had shown her wearing a dress made of spiders and a veil made of cobwebs. Whilst this may sound outlandish, it appeared to be a perfectly acceptable reason amongst the Fae to allow him to stay and teach her Sidhe. 

His arrival in the tiny cottage was a strange and sudden act. Sudden, for he appeared in her dining room without warning, and strange for he appeared in the form of a flock of birds, which eventually came together to form a man.

The Lady’s maid (who went by the name of Maia) shrieked and fell to the ground in a dead faint, but the Lady apparently was far less hysterical and merely cried out in alarm, before realising the significance of what had occurred. 

The first weeks of his arrival were rather confusing, for the Lady did not speak Sidhe, nor did the fae who went by the name of Cassian chose not to speak any tongue of Man. However, they were quite enamoured with each other, and unlike with the men of the village, the Lady seemed quite receptive to his advances. 

And this was not surprising, given that he was quite a striking man, by both the standards of Man and Fae. He dressed normally, cutting a sharp figure in the little sleepy town and despite being able to turn into a flock of birds at will (naturally, rather a strange occurrence), he quite endeared himself to the children of the town, making little shows of transforming into crows and charming the leaves and sticks they brought to him to make them bloom or move without the wind. But there was something about him that gave the townspeople pause, for he almost appeared to be a coiled spring, ready to unleash violence at a moment’s notice. It was also his eyes that made people disconcerted, for they were dark, with no whites and appeared to contain all the depths of the night sky. 

The true nature of the relationship between the Lady of Eadu and the fae who went by the name of Cassian is lost to time, for the simple reason that there was no one there to see - the Lady gradually dismissed all her staff, beginning by sending her maid Maia to get provisions for them and eventually stopping entering the town proper. 

What is known about this period is that they spent most of their time in the library or the garden (for the fae who went by the name of Cassian almost always preferred to be outdoors), both deep in a silent conversation, the nature of which is, obviously, unknown.

As the maid Maia later said, it was almost as though they were in each other’s minds and they had surpassed their differences in language. However, what is known, is that each time the Lady entered the town of Eadu (and the period of time between each visit always grew), her appearance began to change. Her skin seemed to be paler and almost translucent and her eyes were a more brilliant green than they had been before, containing all the depths of life itself, the green of the grass and that of the deadly serpents hidden in it. 

However, as she changed and as she drew back further from the town, the more people whispered. And no one whispered more than one Mister Orson Krennic, owner of the mill in town and a former acquaintance of the Lady’s father. As the rich men are wont to do, he was arrogant and had too much faith in his own abilities and intelligence. 

Rumour had it that he had once sought the Lady’s hand and had been rebuffed none too kindly, and subsequently, he took it into his mind to capture the fae. Thus, knowing a little of magic (as most people did, back in those days), he requested the blacksmith make him a cage of iron with a key for it. 

Then, Krennic told a child to ask the fae to transform into a flock of crows, as he was quite willing to do. Once he had done so, Krennic captured a single bird of the flock and imprisoned it in the cage that he had made. However, it becomes evident of Krennic’s lack of intelligence once one realises that should a single bird be imprisoned, the fae could not transform back into a man. 

Hence, the Lady found it rather easy to track Krennic back to the mill by following the flock of black birds once the child Poe Dameron, naturally quite distraught, had told her of what happened. And Orson Krennic then became aware of precisely the dangers of harming a fae. 

The mill itself became plunged into deep darkness, which no candle or light could penetrate, and trees began to grow through the wooden surfaces of the mill, creating a wood from within the house. Then the mirrors clouded over, showing images of incredible terror that made Krennic’s screams loud enough to be heard from the next town. In his terror, he was able to finally fit the key into the lock and release the fae.

And then the Lady finally showed herself for who she had become, a terror with pale skin and brilliantly green eyes wearing a black dress which he realised was made of living spiders, with a veil made from cobwebs over her hair. 

The ultimate fate of Orson Krennic is currently unknown, but for generations, the children of Eadu have maintained that the scarecrow that overlooks the ruins of the mill is Orson Krennic, still living, but imprisoned in the form of an inanimate object, forced to bear the presence of the Lady’s lover for all eternity. 

As for the Lady herself, her story is a little more open-ended. The child Poe Dameron said that after the events at the mill, he saw the Lady and the fae embracing in a field before they turned into a flock of crows and flew away into the distance. 

**Author's Note:**

> many thanks to the following people for their help: imsfire, fikate and melanoradrood, as always for their support and their headdesking at my dumbass ideas


End file.
